Injured runner not allowed to return to team for State qualifiers, wins FL West

don't let 'em get to you wrote:

brainscan wrote:

Watch this, tell us what you think, honestly:

http://www.flotrack.org/coverage/238143-2011-USATF-Cross-Country-Championships/video/449400-Julie-Nacouzi-5th-place-junior-girls-2011-USA-Cross-Country-Championships

I've coached kids like this before. So she's got a touch of Asperger's, or some other condition that makes her appear or act 'differently' than other people. So what?

There's nothing 'wrong' with her. Her brain just works a bit differently than the rest of us, and she expresses herself differently than the rest of us. Again, so what?

Are you guys that threatened by someone with a 'different' personality that the answer is to make fun of her? Why?

Hopefully, once you grow up, you'll realize that she's most likely a wonderful, nice girl, and that this adolescent desire to mock someone, just because she's more animated than you, is silly.

That said, I could see where she and her coach may have had issues - she seems like a bit of a force of nature, probably unused to people demanding her adherence to the rules. She seems like quite the free spirit, who has had rules changed for her along the way.

Again, it's easy to see how an inflexible coach, or one just unfamiliar with how to deal with kids 'outside the norm' of what we think of as 'normal', would have problems coaching her.

But there's nothing I've seen that would justify anyone mocking her or demeaning her. She's just being herself, she's not hurting anyone, and she's obviously excited about running and racing. I'd be happy to have her on my team, and if anyone on our team talked about her the way she's been talked about in this thread, I'd be kicking a bunch of kids off of the team for being immature, insensitive jerks who have a lot to learn about acting the least bit mature.

I shudder to think what this thread would look like if she were a low IQ special ed student...

J.R. wrote:

Not if I was the coach.

There are two kinds of people in the world, those who try to force others to conform, and those who help others to succeed.

Most of those in business are trying to sell something to customers. But I could never do that, probably because I didn't care if they bought anything, especially something they didn't want. Instead of that, I asked people what they wanted to do, and then I helped them to get what they wanted. My philosphy would be the same as a coach.

By the way, many D1 coaches don't require people to work out at specific times. We had a national record holder on our college team, who only worked out at team practice once, and never again after that. The rest of us were welcome to work out with him, as long as we did it on his schedule, and could keep up with him. Likewise I never did the schedule that was set up by the coach, and he never said a word to me about it. Without going into details, we had a very very good team.

Maximus wrote:

hhhhhHhhhhhh wrote:

Spare us the "kids today" crap. Every generation thinks the next is somehow worse than they were. Well I am pretty sure all the WWII vets thought your generation was the ruination of civilization as they knew it. If you have an opinion about the situation no worries, but let's not believe that kids today are somehow so much worse than you ever were.

If you think today's kids are not different in their views than in the past, you are very naive. Kids definitely feel a sense of entitlement that generations past didn't have. My former coach can't even get kids to come to practice on a regular basis, whereas even as recently as the late 70's, none of us even considered it. We were part of a team and we were there to work hard and listen to our coach. The maturity level is completely different today than it was in the past. Yes that is a generalization and there are some great kids today and lazy kids in the past, but overall it is absolutely true.

Good day.

Maximus wrote:

hhhhhHhhhhhh wrote:

Spare us the "kids today" crap. Every generation thinks the next is somehow worse than they were. Well I am pretty sure all the WWII vets thought your generation was the ruination of civilization as they knew it. If you have an opinion about the situation no worries, but let's not believe that kids today are somehow so much worse than you ever were.

If you think today's kids are not different in their views than in the past, you are very naive. Kids definitely feel a sense of entitlement that generations past didn't have. My former coach can't even get kids to come to practice on a regular basis, whereas even as recently as the late 70's, none of us even considered it. We were part of a team and we were there to work hard and listen to our coach. The maturity level is completely different today than it was in the past. Yes that is a generalization and there are some great kids today and lazy kids in the past, but overall it is absolutely true.

Good day.